McLaren willing to consider options to sign Key early

Zak Brown is open to considering options that would allow McLaren to sign technical director James Key from Toro Rosso early, saying the Formula 1 team has a "plan" to negotiate his current contractual situation.

McLaren announced on Thursday that Key would be joining as its new technical director, but offered no details regarding a start date.

Toro Rosso responded to the announcement by clarifying that Key had a "long-term, valid contract" still to run, meaning he could remain with the team for up to 12 months before being allowed to join McLaren.

Brown confirmed in a press briefing on Saturday that he was not certain when Key would start work with the team.

"We have hired James Key," Brown said. "He will become our technical director. We do not yet have a start date. He does have a current agreement with Toro Rosso which of course, we respect contractual situations.

"I think Toro Rosso and Red Bull are understandably upset that they're losing a great talent like James Key. I think he's recognised as one of the best technical directors up and down the pit lane. We're very excited to have him join us in due course."

Brown said McLaren would be open to considering options to try and get Toro Rosso to release Key from his contract so he can make the move across early, potentially involving a financial settlement or using a driver as a makeweight.

"There's always in the world of Formula 1 ways and opportunities to change situations. That's certainly something that we'd potentially consider, but we have a plan," Brown said.

"We obviously knew his current employment situation and are completely comfortable working around that situation.

"As we've stated before, we've done some restructuring. We've done some hiring. We're not done yet, so we're just head down, operating according to the internal plan that we have."

Toro Rosso is known to have made an approach for McLaren youngster Lando Norris earlier this year as a possible replacement for Brendon Hartley, while Stoffel Vandoorne has also been linked with the Red Bull B-team as part of the driver market movements for 2019.